No one else got out of the van. It sped off into the night before anyone could grab the bag.
The black bag was still on the park bench.
Millie was hugging her father’s legs.
I could sense Chase’s hesitation; I could see his reluctance. Roaring the truck in first gear, I drove over the sidewalk and onto the grassed area of the park.
“Get in the truck!” I yelled at him through the window. “Get Millie into the truck!”
He looked at me, then to his daughter hugging his leg, and then back to the bag. The bag was twenty yards away, close enough for a sprint.
“Don’t do it, Chase!” I roared the accelerator of my truck. “Ignore the bag and get into the truck!”
“What about my money?” He yelled as Millie started crying. “We can’t leave it there!”
Just then headlights rounded the corner and approached the park.
“They’re coming for it, Chase!” I yelled. “If you go for it now, you’ll get shot! We have to leave! Now!”
He took one last look at the money, and then turned to the truck. Picking Millie up, he ran the few yards and placed Millie on the backseat before scrambling in after her.
In that instant, I roared the accelerator of my truck, spinning the tires, and sped away down the street almost before he had even closed the door.
“What about my money? Where is Casey? Is she keeping an eye on it?” He pleaded with me.
“Casey is doing her job.” I turned sharply around a corner. “Right now, our focus is getting Millie out of here.”
Chase looked over his shoulder as we drove away. Millie hugged him tight, but his eyes were on the park as we sped down the road.
We’d left the bag there. We’d left the money behind.
All one million dollars.
Chapter 30
Five days after the intense night, five days after the drop, I sat in my office, feet up on my table, sipping on a glass of whiskey. It was early in the day but so what. Winston Churchill used to have a daily ‘whiskey mouthwash’ in the morning. And if it was good enough for him then it was good enough for me. He once said, ‘When I was younger I made it a rule never to take a strong drink before lunch. It is now my rule never to do so before breakfast.’ Quite right, too. Mine was a glass of Basil Hayden’s, my favorite spirit, a lighter-bodied bourbon. A buttery flavored whiskey with a smooth finish, it was liquid gold, a perfect punch of alcohol and aroma. One of life’s little pleasures and one I felt was well earned.
It had been a crazy two weeks but I was feeling uncharacteristically relaxed.
I sat at my desk reading a second-hand book I picked up that morning, a book by Agatha Christie. A real five star read. The pages were worn, the writing faded, but the story remained the same—a gripping, page-turning and fabulous tale of a private detective. There was no doubt that Hercule Poirot was the greatest investigator in literary history. I read many of those stories as I was growing up, and I often hoped that I would arrive at a remote five-star hotel, where we were snowed in, and one of the guests was murdered during the night. I would gather up the ten other people staying at the hotel, and systematically work out who the killer was in the luxurious surroundings. As a Private Investigator, that was my dream, but mostly, I had to settle for the cut and dried world of crime and betrayal in Chicago.
To work on something like a kidnapping, a case where I was personally invested in the outcome, was the spark that lit my fire. I didn’t sleep for more than three hours over those days, too anxious to rest, too desperate to save Millie from any horrible fate.
Casey and I did that, of course.
We saved Millie.
Not that I ever thought that Damon would’ve harmed Millie. She was always safe in his care. She went back to her mother’s house the day after the drop.
I convinced Chase not to question Millie, to prevent further trauma, and she would speak to him when she was ready. And for his part, I think he felt enough guilt not to want to bring it up.
Millie told Casey about the days she had spent with her grandfather, laughing, playing games and watching old television movies. Apparently, Damon wanted to introduce Millie to the cartoons of his youth—and she spent the bulk of the week watching Disney movies from the fifties. All the while eating her favorite mint chocolate chip ice cream.
Damon’s body was found the next day when the workers arrived—an unfortunate suicide, they ruled it. It was more euthanasia, I would’ve argued, but that isn’t in our law books. The funeral was in two days, and I wasn’t sure that Chase would attend.
Chase paid my fee, fifty thousand as promised, but he wasn’t happy about it. He sent me a three-page email about how my services were highly overrated, and that while he got his daughter back unharmed, he still lost his money. He said that if I was half the investigator that he’d been led to believe, then not only would he have got his daughter back, but it would have been without losing a single cent.
Taking a sip of my whiskey at the chapter break of my book, I leaned back in my chair and drew a deep breath.
I was still waiting for the penny to drop.
I had expected Chase to storm into our office and verbally abuse me days ago, but he clearly hadn’t put it all together yet. It was counting down to almost five full days past the event, and he
